By the time that Alessandro Scarlatti was writing the two serenatas recorded here by Fabio Bonizzoni and La Risonanza and inaugurating an exciting new series on Glossa, that celebratory cantata form, often employing allegorical characters, had been in existence for a mere half century. Scarlatti, as Bonizzoni says, “was one of the main sources of inspiration for Handel whilst the latter was in Italy, and this creates a real continuity with what we have been doing in the recent past”; notably the much-admired septet of recordings devoted to the Saxon composers Italian chamber cantatas.

That sense of continuity extends to the fact that the two works on this new disc – Serenata a Filli and Le muse Urania e Clio lodano le bellezze di Filli – were written in Rome in 1706 and probably for the same patron in Francesco Maria Ruspoli who furthered Handel’s own career. Fresh from his harpsichord recording of Bach’s Die Kunst der Fuge, Fabio Bonizzoni now, with the subtle and stylish instrumentalists of La Risonanza, is not only choosing to illuminate an unexplored genre on record, but is also shedding light on an unknown facet of Alessandro Scarlatti’s own prodigious output. Here, the serenatas are given dramatic vitality by regular partners in Bonizzoni’s artistry: sopranos Emanuela Galli and Yetzabel Arias Fernández and countertenor Martín Oro.

As well as the elder Scarlatti producing examples of these courtly “dramatic cantatas” future releases on this new series will demonstrate the quality of the contributions in the serenata form by Handel himself and also by Antonio Vivaldi.

Fabio Bonizzoni’s series, with La Risonanza, of Handel Italian cantate con stromenti for Glossa has now come to a conclusion with seven volumes recorded, but not before the group were awarded the 2010 Stanley Sadie Handel Recording Prize for the fifth instalment, Clori, Tirsi e Fileno (with sopranos Yetzabel Arias Fernández and Roberta Invernizzi and contralto Romina Basso in the three named roles). In commending the disc the jury of the Recording Prize made the following comments, “La Risonanza produces a delightful performance that presents all of the strengths and virtues we have come to associate with their recent explorations of Handel’s music. [read more...]

In the third instalment in Fabio Bonizzoni’s survey of the secular cantatas with instrumental accompaniment composed by Georg Frideric Handel during his stay in Italy, come a quartet of works associated with the Venice-born maecenas Pietro Ottoboni – including the substantial Ero e Leandro, the libretto for which is plausibly considered to have been written by the Cardinal Ottoboni himself. As well as the seldom-performed cantata for bass, Spande ancora a mio dispetto and Ah! Crudel, nel pianto mio scored for soprano solo, Bonizzoni also directs the Spanish-texted No se emendará jamás.[read more...]